Rs 15 crore unused funds of the dept. of Woman & Child welfare

Seethalakshmi S.
6 Dec, 2006 Times News Network
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BANGALORE: Rs 15 crore accrued but no beneficiaries. This is what the department of women and child development has discovered.

After religiously depositing funds for several years under the Namma Magalu Namma Shakti scheme, to be disbursed to girls from poor families once they attain 18 years, the government has found that the girls who enrolled as beneficiaries for the scheme have disappeared!

"Of the 44,000 cheques that the government readied to be distributed to the girls, 25,000 cheques came back because the families had migrated.We could not trace the girls.With absolutely no tracking system, the scheme was being continued without keeping a check on the movement of beneficiaries. The money was saved but majority of the girls may never benefit from the government's noble intentions,"official sources told TOI.

The Department of Women and Child Welfare has now begun a head-hunt for the girls to disburse the Rs 15 crore that has accrued for the last several years and lying in the government account.

Having learnt a bitter lesson, the department is not taking any chances with the Rs 234-crore Bhagyalakshmi Scheme, where the government deposits Rs 10,000 for girls from BPL families, born after March 31, 2006.

On an average, four lakh girls are born every year in Karnataka of which two lakh belong to the below poverty category.

"It is imperative that we evolve a child-tracking system, so that the scheme benefits the girls. We will involve 10 departments to keep track of the girl right from her birth till she attains 18 years,"Ranjani Srikumar, principal secretary, women and child development department said.

As a first step, the department will create a unique identification number for each of the girl child enrolled in the scheme.

"The partner financial institution will develop a bio-metric system, so that there is no duplication when the girl attains 18 years of age. A central database will be created so that respective departments update the girl's progress from time to time,"she said.

Besides the lumpsum amount when they attain 18 years, the girls will be paid Rs 300 from class one to three per annum, Rs 500 (class four), Rs 600 (class 5), Rs 700 (class 6 and 7), Rs 800 (class 8) and Rs 1,000 (class 9 and 10) "We will lay down guidelines for parents who enroll under the scheme.

They must give an undertaking that the girl will not be married off before she attains 18 years and will not dropout of the school midway. The maturity amount will be forfeited if we find that the girl has been married off,"she said.

A Swiss holiday for Rs 25,000

Swati Anand
5 Dec, 2006 Times News Network
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BANGALORE: The Swiss goodie bag is overflowing — and we’re not just talking chocolates, cheese and Swiss knives. With India contributing to only 2.8% of the foreign tourist pie, Switzerland Tourism is offering a five-night vacation to the Alpine country on a shoestring budget of Rs 25,000 — flights, accommodation, et al.

“Most people perceive Switzerland as an expensive holiday because it’s in Europe. But the truth is that the free individual traveller (FTI) can enjoy almost a week in our country for as little as Rs 25,000,’’ Switzerland Tourism director Federico Sommaruga told The Times of India on Tuesday.

No wonder the FTI segment share has doubled to 50% in five years. Thanks to the secure environment, single women, too, take off on trips on their own. While there are no statistics to prove this, Sommaruga firmly believes that thanks to the strong Bollywood patronage — particularly Yash Chopra’s gossamer romance tales — a Swiss holiday is part of the Great Indian Middle Class Dream.

That’s probably why ‘scouting packages’ are being worked out for film industries across the country, wherein a team of 3-5 people can tour the country at reduced prices scouting for film locales.

Despite the romanticism, honeymooners aren’t very frequent from India. “That’s probably because of the mindset that the tourism season is April-July. Marriages largely take place in monsoon and winter. But now, in Switzerland, there is no offseason — anytime is a good time to visit us.’’

UK supermarket chain outsources to TCS

Indo-Asian News Service
London, December 1, 2006

British supermarket major Somerfield has announced the outsourcing of its IT services to India's Tata Consultancy Services (TCS), a move estimated to save the company 2 million pounds ($3.9m) a year.

The move is expected to result in the loss of 115 of 130 current IT jobs with the company. TCS and Somerfield have signed a seven-year agreement. Somerfield, with 1,300 stores, is Britain's fifth-largest grocery chain.

Several of the employees who would be rendered redundant are likely to be offered jobs by TCS in their offices in Britain.

Somerfield was acquired for 1.1 billion pounds in December 2005 by a consortium made up of property tycoon Robert Tchenguiz, private equity firm Apax and investment bank Barclays Capital.

The new owners have since then undertaken a major review of the business.

Teacher become whistle-blower, exposes siphoning off foodgrains

2 Dec, 2006 Times News Network
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BANGALORE: A teacher has become the whistle-blower of the education department to expose schools which are siphoning off foodgrains under the mid-day meal scheme by faking attendance. The modus operandi of the schools is rather simple: If there are 40 students enrolled in a class, the attendance register will have 50 to 55 students. The additional 10 to 15 students do not exist. They are 'enrolled' to get additional foodgrains which are pocketed by the school staff.

P Asha Kumari, an assistant teacher at the government model primary school, Jakkur, in Yelahanka, has told the Lok Ayukta that the principal and teachers were giving attendance to students, who had either left the school or simply did not exist. "When the children remained absent for more than a fortnight, I grew suspicious and checked the address of the students. While some had left the city, some names were just fake. I was asked to mark attendance for them, which I refused," she told TOI.

Subsequently, when the Lok Ayukta conducted a probe, it indicted four persons in the school for misappropriation.

But that's when trouble began for Asha Kumari. She was harassed by her colleagues,who she claimed did not allow to carry-out her routine work. "They would ask students to shout slogans against me and they would unnecessarily find fault with my work," she said. Such was the harassment that Upa Lok Ayukta Justice G Patri Basavana Goud wrote to primary education secretary T M Vijaybhaskar in May 2006 urging him to transfer her to another school.

"It is unfortunate that a teacher who came forward to give information and who was instrumental in unearthing a major scandal is being harassed. I request you to transfer her," the letter said. In June 2006, the department transferred her from the Yelahanka school to the government primary school in Cholanayakahalli.

"It was the same story here too. Fake attendance and students. The school knew that I was transferred because I exposed misappropriation. They began threatening me. I am being harassed again" she said.

Following a complaint on November 17, 2006, the Lok Ayukta has now issued notices to the Cholanayakahalli school too, seeking explanation.

Air Deccan to reach Gulbarga, Hassan

2 Dec, 2006 Times News Network
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GULBARGA: The Air Deccan has written a letter to the Karnataka government, dated November 24, expressing its readiness to provide its service in Gulbarga and Hassan, said V. P. Balegar, principal secretary to the infrastructure development department of the Karnataka government,on Wednesday.

Participating in an interactive programme, organised by the Hyderabad-Karnataka CII, Balegar said that the Union government in its letter to the Karnataka government in October,had sought information on which company would provide its air facility if airports were started in Hassan and Gulbarga, for which it was ready to provide a special grant of Rs. 20 crore to the selected company.

He said that 567 acres of land has already been acquired in Srinivas Saradgi village, which is in the outskirts of Gulbarga City and he has asked the Gulbarga deputy commissioner to acquire another 125 acres of land for expanding the proposed Gulbarga airport into an international airport.Balegar said the construction of Gulbarga airport would commence as soon as the Airport Authority of India gave its nod.

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Rajasthan CM Raje under fire for 'lip lock' picture!

Indo-Asian News Service

Jaipur, December 1, 2006

Rajasthan Chief Minister has come in for scathing criticism from several quarters for posing with Biocon's Kiran Majumdar Shaw in a "lip lock" position at the India Economic Submit in New Delhi.

The photograph was carried by some of national as well as local dailies.

The Congress has raised strong objections over the chief minister's exchange of pleasantries with Shaw.

"It's a cultural shock to the people of the state," senior Congress leader Raghu Sharma said.

"The chief minister has her own style. She may do whatever she wants in her personal life but she should not forget that she is the chief minister and should maintain the sanctity of her post," said Puja Mathur, a college student.

"Such ways of greeting are not prevalent even in foreign countries. This is not at all acceptable. Moreover, the chief minister is an icon for the state and people follow her. When she behaves in such a manner, then what message is she sending to the people?" asked entrepreneur P.K. Singh.

Meanwhile, state Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) president Mahesh Sharma said it "is not good to raise such light issues.

"These are non-issues, which should not be emphasised," he said.

2 Gadag girls sold for Rs 2 lakh

30 Nov, 2006 Times News Network

GADAG/HUBLI: The courage shown by a seventh-standard girl could very well lead to her sister's freedom and also give the police a clue as to where many other missing children of Sortur village of Shirahatti taluk in Gadag are.

When this girl, Soumya, and her sister Neelamma, studying in tenth standard, went missing from Gadag bus stand a month ago, few knew that they had been sold by their unscrupulous father.

The pieces started falling into place after Soumya ran away from her captors and sought the help of Gujarat Police who contacted Gadag superintendent of police K V Shridhar.

What's intriguing is that even though for a month the children have been missing, their parents never filed a police complaint.

The mother of the children told a police team that visited the village that the children had gone to Maharashtra. The father, Shenkappa Khannur, is not traceable and is reported to be hiding with his son in Bangalore.

Shridhar, who suspects this to be a case of sale of girls, told The Times of India on Thursday that the help of Bangalore police had been sought.

The incident has now rattled the villagers who suspect that Ramana Tavaknavar of the same village has acted as a middleman in the sale of the girls for Rs 1 lakh each to some people in Gujarat.

They feel that many other children who had disappeared in the past might have also been similarly sold.

A team of police personnel from Gadag is on its way to Surat to bring the two girls back to Sortur village. Once they are back, the police will register a case and begin investigation.